16bit.com Updates

We updated our Simpsons area today with new entries including the Treehouse of Horror figures and playset. Because we know you love them.

We got a request for compatibility lists for playsets and figures so it looks like we will be doing those at some point in the near future.

Adam has been talking about doing a Q&A column similar to what he does on Rebelscum, but here, and for other stuff. Send him your toy or other inquiries.

We're aiming to have something new on this site every weekday, so be back tomorrow to see if we can actually do it.

Lastly, our next import feature-- as in "we don't have these but we wanna get them and put them on the site"-- is hopefully going to be on the Japanese Episode One Palm Talker figures, a set of five deformed talking figures from Tomy. If you know of a good deal on these, please write in. (Either that or Adam's Microman "stash.")

Dreamcast Updates

Unless you're living under a rock, you've undoubtedly heard of the Sega situation. Today, the company reported the console would drop to $99 and loose change on February 4. Possibilities of Saturn titles on the PlayStation, new GameBoy Advance titles, and others are being mentioned, but most interesting of all was a blurb on IGN that touted a Dreamcast sequel to the beautiful piece of gaming known as Jet Grind Radio. (We'll buy it.)

TransFormers Japan & PVC News

Ben Yee's www.bwtf.com posted a scan of 2001 TransFormers which answered two questions. The first, there will be some sort of TransFormers line in 2001. The second, well, we now know that the hole in the Optimus PVC is for something-- a chase figure in Act 2 will have a rocket pack. Check out his site for the image and more!

Fun Link

Lego fan Eric Harshbarger posted images of a giant Lego Milhouse (of Simpsons fame) sculpture to his website. Other sculptures include Bart Simpson, R2-D2, San from Princess Mononoke, and a really nifty parrot. Be sure to check it out.

16bit.com Updates

Simpsons 2001 News

Scott Wegrzyn sent in a scan of an advertisment from the newest ish of Lee's Action Figure News and Toy Review (not posted here due to potential copyright shenanigans) with pictures of and names for Simpsons figures through October.

The info, she is as follows:Series 3: January
Moe
Nelson
Kamp Krusty Bart
Sunday Best Homer
Millhouse
Nelson
Otto
Sideshow Bob with Krustylu Studios
Mayor Quimby with Town Hall

NOTABLE: The picture shows a trio of figures that are not in the lists. If these are upcoming previews, unknown exclusives, or just something cool to ruin our day, we don't know. Included are: Kang & Kodos, Radioactive Man. Another face was unidentifiable in the picture, but we plan to have a closer observation soon...

Conspicuously absent from here is Selma, Mrs. Krabappel, and Daredevil Bart. More conspicuous, however, is the fact that we can't remember where we heard those three "confirmed" in the first place. (We're fairly sure it was the Living Room Playset instruction sheet, but we can't seem to find it...)

Again, another big shout-out to Scott to sending in the scan. Sure, it ruins the surprise of Toy Fair '01, but hey, now we know today. There's supposedly other stuff in the works, like guest-star figures and the like, so odds are there will be something new introduced at Toy Fair. If Kang & Kodos are any indication, there's hope for a second Treehouse of Horror set...

16bit.com Updates

Over the weekend, we added some stuff. So yeah.

We added a page for the Treehouse of Horror Giftset with a variety of close-up and detail shots, and some additional images on the TOH figures. (For example, we forgot Flanders' pitchfork. Because we're stupid.)

Also, we've added a page with the Star Wars: Episode One Accessory Sets. Wave 1 was up on an old ASWN web page (ASWN: now-defunct Adam's Star Wars Newsletter), and the page was fun to do and now it's up here. We started Wave 2 and hope to have it done in the coming weeks. We should note that we have no intent of becoming a Star Wars image archive. For that, please visit Rebelscum or Yakface's Realm.

We will, however, continue to highlight some of the neater items if we're so inclined. And in this case, we're so inclined. (I think some stuff on the nastier SW toys would be fun. The upcoming Snowbi-Wan deserves some sort of recognition. Especially if it's crap.)

Astoundingly, we have yet to add our videogame content, and this domain was purchased in 1998 with the intent of making a game site. Funny how things work out some time, eh?

New From Takara: Another Captain Power?

The toymaker responsible for virtually every TransFormer to date as well as the popular GaoGaiGar line (it's Japanese, it's cool, trust me) has unveiled a new range of transforming toys called Web Divers. Links to images (in other words, here's a link to a link to the pictures) are available at Bigbot.com.

From the look of things, these may be interactive transforming toys with some sort of Captain Power-esque sort of feature. The highlight of the line is a large dragon which seems to transform into a viking ship. (But I'm not sure if it's a transformation or some sorta combo thing.) The bulk of the designs are undeniably goofier than TransFormers: Car Robots, as a car transforms into some form of large cat robot thing.

Simpsons Follow-Up

The advertisment we mentioned yesterday was a trade ad of sorts advertising the Simpsons range winning Action Figures News & Toy Review's "Best Action Figure Line of 2000" award. It features "casual Homer" tilted, in shades, saying, "Woo-Hoo! We Won, We Won!" over a group shot of figures from the entire line but not all of the figures. This would be the beginning of a very nice poster if Playmates opted to make such an item.

It appears in AFN&TR Issue 100. Bartman appears on the cover. We have yet to see this magazine in person, although we're watching the local Barnes & Noble and Borders stores for the newsstand edition...

We at 16bit.com would like to congratulate Playmates on doing something toy companies rarely do: announcing their toy line on their own terms before a report from Toy Fair in New York or a leak somewhere in the grapevine. Kudos to you, Playmates. Other toy companies have a lot to learn from you when it comes to getting news out.

We now return you to our regularly scheduled non-news.

Notable Toy Clearances

The local Factory 2U was stocked full of Hasbro's nine-inch DC Comics figures for $5 each, quite a few of Hasbro's on-line exclusive twelve-inch figures for $10, Muftak and Kabe from Star Wars for $3 and change, a plethora of twelve-inch Joes for $10 per, and a lot of other stuff. If you have one in your area, it's definitely worth a look.

16bit.com Updates

Due to requests from the peanut gallery we added a second Simpsons Checklist, this one lists figures by wave with the projected release month next to upcoming figures. Some revisions were made to some other checklists as well.

We've also got our first Worthless Feature in the can for posting tomorrow. Unless we decide to add something worthwhile, which has been known to happen in the past on two occasions.

TransFormers & Joes '01

In no unpredictable move, Hasbro announced today some of its new product. Most interesting was the following excerpt...

TRANSFORMERS: There are robots, and then there are ROBOTS IN DISGUISE. The original toy robot that took the world by storm in the '80s comes full circle with the return of ROBOTS IN DISGUISE. Hasbro is bringing back the ``classic'' theme for TRANSFORMERS right down to the car-to-robot transformation. Plus, in the fall, Fox Kids will begin airing all-new TRANSFORMERS ROBOTS IN DISGUISE programming six days per week. Approximate retail: $4.99-29.99; Availability: August 2001.

I'm thinking we might see some reissues like Japan. Adam takes this to mean new toys of old characters, or some new characters as well. Either way, as long as there's a new Optimus Prime and Soundwave in there somewhere, I'm sure everybody will be happy.

Also notable was the GI Joe section which mentioned "...a new generation of kids is discovering G.I.JOE figures, and Hasbro will unveil a new kids-focused line at Toy Fair." Another one? After the originals, Adventure Team, Real American Hero, Sgt. Savage, and Extreme, one would assume they've found something that would work.

Needless to say the 16bit.com Staff is very much looking forward to Toy Fair now.

More Toy Fair News

Action-Figure.com has posted quite a bit of new toy news, including the line-up of Movie Maniacs IV, news on Jurassic Park III Lego, and a bit of Simpsons news, namely images of the family car! Check it out.

Toy Fair '01

Color me impressed.

Some new news in the past few days, so here's a quickie directory of what you can find out there.

Hasbro
STAR WARS: The Official Site has added images of the Toy Fair show room. New figures pictured include Ketwol, Bespin Security Guard, the imperial astromech droid with what seems to be a holographic Death Star, X-Wing Luke (bad picture), Sandtrooper (bad picture), Expanded Universe Qui-Gon (bad picture), and a decent shot of the Obi-Wan in cold training outfit or whatever. Basically, Obi-Wan comes in an outfit that looks like a hybrid of Luke and Han's outfits from Hoth. While not a movie figure (or something I can even think of appearing elsewhere), the sculpt looks good and the design isn't bad. I'm actually looking forward to this one. Nothing else new seems to have appeared on the page.

TRANSFORMERS: We posted the news on the press release yesterday, and the buzz on usenet is that a web site (that shall remain nameless in case it's totally off) may post images of the new range very soon, if they haven't already. (While very little has been said about what they will be, we're hoping they won't be reissues of the Car Robots. We already have most of the ones we want.)

It's a slow day. So beware the Tiki, the most worthless, underdeveloped idea we hope to post on this web site.

We scored three of the Wave 3 guys in addition to the playsets, those should be up over the weekend, later today, or by Monday. Just come back Monday, you'll see Sideshow Bob, Quimby, Millhouse, Nelson, and the amazingly excellent Moe figure. (Believe it or not, they were at a local Electronics Boutique for $5.99 per. Thanks for the tip, Zac!)

First impressions: not overwhelmingly positive. While Moe and Nelson turned out pretty great, I've got a list of problems with Millhouse as a toy. (Yes, yes, I know. "Worst figure ever." I'm a fanboy, deal with it.) I left Homer and Bart there because, well, if they don't show up at the regular cheap stores en masse, I'll be astounded. (Zac bought the last Otto.)

Oh, we should also note that Action Figure News & Toy Review #100 has shots of Captain McCallister, Bumblebee Man, Martin, Jimbo, Sideshow Mel, Kent Brockman, Bartman, and Reverend Lovejoy. Sideshow bob is complete with his slide whistle, the ol' Captain has a pipe which can be held in his hand or his mouth, Bartman is 60% recycled materials, and Martin & Bumblebee Man look pretty great. Lovejoy is pretty lackluster, Jimbo looks like a creation of the production company behind Chicken Run, and Brokman looks pretty dull. Not bad, just not dynamic in any way, shape, or form. Looks like Wave 5 is more good than bad, always a plus.

Our compatibility list is in progress, which will list every figure, every playset, and of course, who works with what. Yes, I know, you're all just thrilled about it. Should be up early next week, or not.

Toy Fair '01

Hasbro
TRANSFORMERS: According to the best pretty-much official site out there (BWTF.com), the new line will be a repackaging of Japan's 2000 line: Car Robots. (Wow, sure am glad I used up a ton of my toy money last year importing five of them...) At least I won't be spending much money on TransFormers this year... not American stuff, anyway.

Rude Awakening

When I had to get up extra early yesterday (well, today, this update is being written Thursday), I heard an ad on the ol' TV with what sounded like a new version of one of my favorite Devo tunes, "Beautiful World." It was a Target advertisment. Did anyone at Target ever actually listen to the lyrics particularly closely?

16bit.com Updates

We also found Sunday Best Homer, Kamp Krusty Bart, and Otto at Wal-Mart yesterday evening. This in and of itself is not especially notable, but the figures were $2.25 each for some reason. We believe we're on track for having most of these up by Monday. (Note we didn't say which Monday.)

By Request

We were asked what Otto said. Now we know some of the lines, which are as follows:

Toy Fair Updates: Day 1

Toy Fair started off with a bang yesterday. Ordinarily we'd say "just go to the Raving Toy Maniac" but as of right now, we see nothing on their site, and rumors concerning the fantastic site's future are less than positive. Since everybody's posting different content, here's the 16bit Digest of what you might want to see...

GI Joe (Four inch):Yo Joe has news and links to a variety of recent (and recently released) items in the Real American Hero range.

GI Joe (Twelve inch):Master Collector has posted images of the new GI Joe 12" body which includes new "Gung-Ho" grip. Which are genuine articulated fingers. The site also previews the new Joe body, which looks a lot like a Dragon figure with better articulation. Check it out!

McFarlane:
A post to the rec.toys.action-figures.discuss newsgroup mentioned Spawn.com will be posting their entire Toy Fair catalog today. Word has it The Doors are included in this years' line-up, so between Vital's Devo line and this announcement, it looks to be a very good year for music toys. (Now where's our They Might Be Giants, Aquabats, and Man Or Astro-man lines? [Yes, yes, I know. Right after Skafish.])

Star Wars:
Both Rebelscum and Yakface have posted their Toy Fair '01 sections with detail photos of what's been seen earlier on Starwars.com. Rebelscum has a slightly better layout with slightly better images, but Yak has different images (including a better shot of Ketwol's special feature, a must-see). So be sure to check out both for what's sure to be one of the best years for new stuff ever.

TransFormers:
Some of the Japanese Car Robot toys have been shot and/or mentioned in official Hasbro information on their web site or in their annual report. Toy Fair photography of the showroom was unavailable at the time we posted this message. So far, it looks like most, if not all, of Japan's 2000 line will be localized. This should prove interesting, as the mid-size cars are more than a bit of a pain to transform (and we have the bruised thumbs to prove it).

Other:Action-Figure.com posted much in the way of new info on a variety of lines. Two new Thunderbirds figures, what looks to be a very cool Jurassic Park III Walking Raptor toy, and oh yeah, Hasbro has gotten the license for sure-fire joke fodder when it comes down to remembering the decade with Fox Kids' Los Luchadores. For release in early 2002. Ironic, given much of Hasbro's woes were scapegoated on picking up bad licenses...

Vintage Star Wars Figure Discovery

The Star Wars Collectors Archive has posted images of a new prototype of Gargan, one of two unmade Star Wars movie figures from the original line. Included with it are additional images of the other known Gargan prototypes. It's well worth a look, after all, it is a piece of toy history...

Groove-y DVD News

The DVD File is reporting regular and special editions for the highly underrated marvel of Disney animation, The Emperor's New Groove, will be coming to DVD this May. (We're happy. That was a great li'l flick.)

Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker Uncut

For those who know where to look online, this has been leaked to the web in all its "do not rent" and Hong Kong subtitled splendor. (And yes, we got a good look at it.) While I haven't seen the regular release version yet, this was an amazing, astounding, magnificent flick, even though it was direct-to-video. If you have the means, track this down, and if you see a petition to release the uncut version, sign it.

Some friends and the staff got together to watch two gems of the 1980's, one of which is gonna be featured on this site pretty soon, so stay "tooned." (That was one of those bad pun hints the kids love so much.)

16bit.com Updates

We added Barney to our Simpsons Archive. (Woulda added more, but eh, been a busy weekend.)

16bit.com Request

We need an album from The Plastics called "Welcome Plastics." (Not to be confused with "Welcome Back Plastics.") It's from Japan, it's a Japanese band, and well, from what we've heard, it's pretty good. If anybody has a copy to sell, please don't hesitate to email me.

Toy Fair Updates: Day 2

And now, the real fun begins... after showing off a few neat items on The Today Show and other morning programs, it seems that a lot more stuff has shown up. Including...

GI Joe (Twelve inch) & Other 1/6 Figures:Small Blue Planet Toys has a ton of images and info from Dragon, Hasbro, 21st Century, and other companies. Don't miss this if you're in to this scale of figure.

McFarlane:
As planned, McFarlane posted their catalogs with no real surprises. A few new Spawn ranges, Jim Morrison from The Doors, Jerry Garcia, Metal Gear Solid 2, a second Anime line, and some other lines of mention were posted. Be sure to visit their site for the full catalog.

MGS2 has a neat distinction in that each figure includes a component to build another figure... if that isn't incentive to collect them all, I don't know what is. Friends of the site and staff members have pondered when this would happen for years, and we're glad to see that someone found a good place to use it.

We're planning on adding MGS2 and the second Anime line to the site upon their release. (Of course, this means we're going to have to pony up for the first series of the Anime guys now... where we'll find Vash & Kaneda's Bike, I don't know... if anybody's got a set to trade, kindly write in. We've got stuff to swap.)

McFarlane's got us all tingly for '01. Don't miss their own site's coverage of their stuff, it's a killer.

TransFormers:
Thank Wonko once again for giving us the scoop. Previously unseen Beast Machines toys and gobs of info on Robots in Disguise have been posted to his site, BWTF.com. The additions to Beast Machines are pretty slick, and they're doing some great stuff with Robots in Disguise like multi-packs giving more toys for the buck. This, we dig.

New Megatron head, new jets... good deal. We're really stoked about the Battle Unicorn toy. Looks like that really cool Micronauts horse we always pine over, just a bit more colorful.

Simpsons:
Not much beyond the previously mentioned figures, car, and deluxe figures. It looks like a box set of PVCs will be marketed to the USA, and contrary to what we thought earlier, these are apparently not an import set of the UK/etc. Burger King PVCs. (Thanks Neil for the heads-up.)

Anyone know if the Dot Pals are Mac compatible?

All in all, Toy Fair '01 is a pretty great looking year, nowhere near as dismal as last year was in terms of showings of all-new, fantastically amazing goodies. Sure, we saw a few new Star Wars and Simpsons guys last year, but this year Hasbro's got an all-new GI Joe body, McFarlane's got some amazing new licenses and some marvelous spins on older items, Playmates has still more Simpsons... things are good. We're still waiting on pics of Vital Toys' Devo set.

New Toy Sightings

We neglected to mention that some new goodies have shown up around town, namely the American McGee's Alice figures (which are nothing shy of mind-bogglingly cool) and the US versions of Final Fantasy IX packs I and II (two 2-packs: Vivi & Zidane, Dagger & Steiner.) We should note that we feel the Japanese originals looked slightly better in most cases.

And we'd like to conclude today by stating that we feel the new Disneyland Indiana Jones figure looks like absolute crap. (Don't care if it's Indy, it sucks. We deserve better.)

16bit.com Updates

We changed our checklists to include 2001 product for the Simpsons (2000) and Metal Gear Solid toy lines with information as up-to-date as we had available.

Checklists for other toy lines have been created and may be posted prior to a section being available on a specific line, namely the sundry McFarlane Music figures, the McFarlane Anime figures, and a bunch of other stuff we haven't figured out how we're going to deal with yet. Some are gonna get covered in full here... some aren't. Stay tuned.

So yeah. Valentine's Day still totally sucks. There should be some place for the bitter, single people to go and yell at the happy smiley folk.

Toy Fair Updates: Day Whatever

Well, we missed yesterday. Unfortunately, it happens.

GI Joe: A Real American Hero (3.75"):Steel Brigade posted some images of new, upcoming releases for the line. Some were pretty neat. Some... eh... not so much. Take a look, because love 'em or hate 'em, it's worth a look-see. Looks like we're in for more affilliation change based repaints...

16bit.com Updates

Q&A Begins Monday

Do you have a question that's begging to be answered? We've added a member to our staff to handle Q&A, but his email isn't set up yet. So in the meantime, send it to me and I'll se he gets it. The first installment goes up Monday.

Toy Fair Updates: Show's Over

After it's all said and done, there weren't too many big surprises. McFarlane once again pulled out all the stops to make sure their offerings were online first thing Monday morning, and while Star Wars got good official coverage, the fans trumped it and most of Hasbro's lines wouldn't have been covered were it not for some speciality sites.

The biggest surprise-- and one we just heard through the grapevine-- was N2 Toys' intent to produce six figures based on the great, underappreciated Fifth Element. While we love hearing some of our favorite characters will be seen in plastic, we're saddened to hear that they'll be made by the people who brought us The Matrix, which were decidedly average, and Mad Max, which has packaging so bad it looks worse than some bootlegs I've bought. Unpainted prototypes were shown at Toy Fair, and lemme tell ya, if you want a bad initial reaction from people, start by showing them unpainted prototypes. The Diva's lips looked huge, Zorg looked like he had potential, and the packaging looks on par for N2's previous offerings. (Seriously, folks, Darryl, myself, or a an old-world monkey suffering from severe mental redardation could do something more original than this bootlegish nonsense.)

Mezco's Cryptozoology line turned out kinda cool. I dig Nessie. (Yes, enough to snag one if the price isn't obscene.) If you go out and check all the figure sites, odds are you're sure to find something new to tickle your fancy. (Or many things.)

No Devo shown. Bah.

HEY TOY BIZ

If you're reading this, and we know you probably aren't, please email us.

Television Man

16bit Labs has recently been directed to a video store mere blocks from our central location that has scores of videos from the 1980s. Included are old videos of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, scores of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, old FHE TransFormers tapes, and the legendary piece of animation schlock, Cartoon All-Stars To The Rescue. (Anti-drug messages don't win any awards when your product is junk, folks.) We've rented some of these. We have video capture equipment. Care to guess where we're going with this?

16bit.com Updates

Q&A: Our once-automated Computer Tiki has now assumed full Q&A duties and will be updating whenever enough questions are sent his way to make an update worthwhile. So please, feel free to read the column and pipe in with any questions you might have to Darryl until his and The Computer Tiki's 16bit addresses are up and running.

We still have a bunch of half-finished articles and features dating back from as far as 1998 that, with any luck, should be nearing completion some time before Hell freezes over.

My former publication/lifestyle choice ASWN (Adam's Star Wars Newsletter) will be revived in the coming week. So if you care, keep watching the page for more info. (And if you have any back issues, please contact me. I haven't exactly kept the best records of the newsletter, and well, I'd really like to see what it was I wrote over the past six years.)

Toy Fair Updates: GASP! MORE!

At actionfigures.about.com, Bobbi Boyd posted tons of news and images on stuff I don't think we've seen elsewhere, including the new Space Ghost guys, Jurassic Park 3 Lego, and some Harry Potter goods. Well worth a look-see.

Simpsons Toy Updates

Welp, we found where we confirmed Daredevil Bart and Patty-- it was, in fact, the Living Room instruction sheet. (I gotsta scan these things.) It's entirely possible Daredevil bart was changed into Bartman, but both Patty and Selma appear on that instruction sheet. Granted, things change, and it's entirely possible that these figures have been canned (since we don't have contact info for Playmates, we can't be sure), but hey, good to know.

DVD Fun Fun Week

Kevin Smith's Clerks Uncensored DVD has been released and yes, it is uncensored. They left that Flintstone's List thing in there. Still, it's an enjoyable watch and on sale for $19.99 at Best Buy this week.

Still No Webslingers In Arizona?

This is sort of a straw poll. If anybody out there has found those new Spider-Man figures with the countless articulation and the comic books, please write in with where you found them.

Q&A Tuesday

New Supernova!!!

Friend of 16bit.com DJ Lipgloss has contacted me to let me know that one of the best bands you've never heard, Supernova, has released a compilation of rare and unusual tracks on the Sympathy for the Record Industry label. It's been listed under multiple titles, including Pop As A Weapon on CDNOW (and all the cover art shown online), Collection on Sympathy's page, and More Songs About Hair on a few other places. We'll post more info and perhaps our first review to the music section when the CD shows up at the local record store.

Best known for their tune Chewbacca in the movie Clerks, their previous albums Ages 3 And Up and Supernova (aka Rocks) are more or less what you might expect as a side project from a former member of Servotron and Man Or Astro-Man. The new comp includes many (but not all) of the tunes from their various 7" vinyl releases. Their sublime cover of the Go-Gos tune How Much More is noticably absent.

Don't miss their marvelous web site, which hasn't been updated since 1999!

Spider-Man Classics Figures from Toy Biz

Well folks, how've ya been? Found a Spider-Man Man-Spider figure. Whoa. If you haven't had the pleasure of seeing one, you'll soon understand why I spend several hours over the weekend scouring 4 Wal-Marts (some twice), five malls, four Targets, three K-marts, four Toys "R" Uses, and a few other stores trying to find ANY of these damned things. Wal-Mart price is said to be pennies under $6, and each figure has scads of articulation and/or deco to make your teeth sweat with delight.

The Man-Spider figure base has more detail than most figures I own. Snakes, skeletons, moss, dirt, rocks, just about everything one might expect in a swamp base, and some one might not. The "water" is a layer of clear plastic, complete with bubbles and ripples, that is fully removable and there's room to stick your own swampy goodness underneath. When it comes time to do the full review, expect as much on the base as you'll see on the figure.

While most of the new Spidey-guys scream "30 points of articulation," we haven't gotten those yet. Man-Spider has only 10 points of articulation, but it's 10 points of well-hidden articulation, five of which are amazingly well disguised ball joints. It's a statue. It's a toy. And boy, does it smell funny when you open it.

This particular comic book was nothing to write home about... but still, cool stuff for free.

Needless to say, I spent some considerable time looking at local stores today and yesterday for Spider-Man, Spider-Man (Black), and Venom. Didn't find 'em.

We'll be posting a disgustingly in-depth feature on these guys soon upon arrival. (As in "marathon web work session to get these up ASAP.") It's not often a toy shows up that's a dramatic shift from what we've seen before. The 1995 Boba Fett raised a lot of eyebrows. McFarlane showed what we could expect from his fledgling company with Malebolgia in Spawn Series 2. Playmates wowed the market with a low cost collectible line with The Simpsons. And now, Toy Biz has managed to make dirt-cheap, well-articulated, well-painted, stands-included, "dear-God-how-cool-is-this?" figures which prove that toys actually have a long way to evolve between now and the time we revert back to wooden pull toys.

We'd show ya a pic, but a quickie shot wouldn't do it justice. If you have the slightest-- and I mean miniscule, minute, virtual non-interest in toys, I still highly reccomend you score Man-Spider just to admire what a good toy can look like when a company really gives a product its all AND comes in at under $10. Waaaaay under $10.

If Simpsons was the shining jewel of 2000, Spider-Man Classics is our early contender for 2001's best new line.

Q&A Wednesday

Darryl lied. Sue him.

Checklists Update

Darryl updated the Simpsons checklists with the new Pin Pal Mr. Burns from ToyFare. But you knew that.

RIP eToys

Etoys to file for bankruptcy. One of the best sources for clearance goodies and some hard-to-find plastic men will be no more, says financial reports the web over.

Q&A Wednesday

TransFormers PVCs Act 2

The second batch of Japanese PVC figures is still supposedly on schedule for April. Included are Optimus Prime (Truck), Grimlock (T-Rex), Minerva, Galvatron, Hot Rod, and Powermaster Optimus Prime. We recently saw Act 1 at a mall anime store at the ludicrous price of $14.99 per figure.

Pin Pal Burns Release Date (Sortof)

Mr. Burns will be the special ToyFare figure in issue #46, which is a short two months away. Issue #44, currently on newsstands, shipped a couple of weeks ago.

When you'll actually get it in the mail is anybody's guess. Radioactive Homer (Glow-in-the-dark) was offered in August and showed up in the Fall.

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